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God Is Love: Do You Realize How Amazing That Is?

Unbelievers all seem to have their own ideas of who or what God is. For many, they claim He doesn’t exist. For others, He does exist, but He’s not active in creation in any personal way. Then there are some who believe, if He exists, He would have to be some kind of tyrannical, destructive, selfish, mean dictator — otherwise how do you explain pain, disease, natural disasters, starvation, and human suffering?

At least, that’s what I’ve heard on more than one occasion. But I think it goes without saying that no unbeliever can be faulted for their view of God — whatever it may be — because they don’t know Him. And they don’t understand sin.

Romans 1 says all are “without excuse” in terms of the existence of God, but a tree isn’t going to transmit the Gospel of John or the Old Testament into anyone’s soul. Considering the pretenses of the unconverted, it also goes without saying that God is not going to seem loving to them. After all, “A god that allows any kind of evil could not possibly be loving.” Moreover, “A god who sends people to hell could not possibly be loving.”

Unpacking those arguments against God would require their own articles. However, reflecting on how unbelievers define Him made me realize something: How amazing is it that God is not like that? That He is just toward the wicked, and wrathful toward sin, and yet, He is a loving Father. You don’t know this until you know Him by being in a relationship with Him. And even then, I believe we undermine how significant this truly is.

R.C. Sproul, pastor and theologian, once said, “[A]n evangelist can always get a crowd if he continually speaks in meaningless terms about the love of God.” In other words, it’s easy to be flippant because, as he continued to say, “I don’t think there’s any word in the English language that’s been stripped of the depth of meaning such as that word love.” These statements are pulled from his sermon series, “Loved by God,” in which he emphasized the crucial distinction between secular love and biblical love — more specifically, the slippery slope of viewing biblical love through the lens of secular love. It’s a conflation we ought to avoid.

When we view the love of God by any secular standard or definition, we flatten it. We strip it of its magnitude, and we only do ourselves a disservice in the process. Yes, to some extent, our perspectives will always be tainted by our finite understandings, but we (particularly believers) should strive to understand Scripture as it pertains to its holy Author, not by its flawed readers. The reason why Sproul emphasized the common misuse of the word “love” is because, in relation to God, it should cause us to be dumbfounded. Truly analyzing the love of God should leave us breathless and in awe.

God could have been all wrath, all fury, all judgement, and all the things many unbelievers make Him up to be. But instead, even before the foundation of the world, He is (and will always be) love. He didn’t need to create us, because even before us, He, the Son, and the Spirit all had their being within one another — the perfect and holy Trinity. However, He chose to create us. And the Garden of Eden was one of His first depictions of love toward us because it was a depiction of how things were supposed to be. Work was not laborious but enjoyable. Adam and Eve could walk with God, unhindered, in the cool of the day. Sin had not flooded into the earth, which meant there was no separation between the Creator and His created beings.

But God also showed us His love by giving us free will, even though Adam and Eve used that free will to rebel against Him. However, their rebellion is what led to the most perfect display of love we could ever fathom both in the macro and the micro sense of the term.

In love, God made a plan to redeem us. He sent down His Son, who then walked among us, despised and rejected. The Son of Man was mocked, beaten, and scorned by the men of earth. He stripped Himself of His glory, faced the complete wrath of His Father, and died an indescribably painful death. He suffered in more ways than one, but in no way greater than by taking on the sins of all mankind to make us right with God. He rose again on the third day and shortly after ascended to the right hand of the Father.

And still, we were not left alone.

The Spirit of God flooded the earth and now dwells in those who believe. So, even amid the horrors of this life — the pain, suffering, illnesses, disasters, wars, and persecution — we have never been left alone. The unbeliever could never understand how these evils only exist because of sin. Nor could they understand how much they reveal God’s love and goodness.

But you see it, right? Even before the fall, God already had a plan to restore the perfect union represented in the garden to an even greater capacity. He has never stopped pursuing His people. All of time portrays the message of Romans 8:35-39:

“Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, ‘For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.’ No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.”

My God is Love. He sent His own Son to die for me. He is faithful, merciful, and gracious to ensure nothing could separate us from Him. The God I serve is patient when I fall short. He is tender and kind. My God is sovereign and holds me in His righteous right hand. He walks me through the valley of the shadow of death. He keeps me afloat in the bottomless pool and unscathed in the middle of the fire. He disciplines and guides me when I go astray. Even when I ignore or disobey, He remains planted with arms wide open, ready to embrace even the most dreadful of sinners.

All of this is true because my God is love.

Sproul said no word is more stripped of its meaning than the word “love,” because there are no number of words that could do it justice. But this I know: If you really pay attention to the love of God and it doesn’t leave you starstruck, then you’re either reading it with too much of a secular understanding or you’re simply serving the wrong god.

AUTHOR

Sarah Holliday

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: CDC: Teen Girls Say Their Faith Is the Top Reason They Haven’t Had Sex

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Young Americans Think the Holocaust Is a ‘Myth,’ ‘Exaggerated,’ or Political Ploy

Philosopher George Santayana is often attributed with coining the phrase, “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” Such a well-known saying almost seems cliché. But does it have merit? Reflecting on Ecclesiastes 1:9, we know there is nothing new under the sun, and we often see history repeat itself, or even take on new meaning (for better or for worse).

As time widens the gap between the past and the present, it’s easy to forget what has occurred. Perhaps more concerning, it’s easy to remember historical events incorrectly. This begets three possible outcomes: learning the wrong lessons, fabricating lessons that push a certain narrative, or just not learning any lesson at all. The actions of our day imply we’ve experienced all three.

Osama Bin Laden, founder of the terrorist organization al-Qaeda and primary perpetrator of the 9/11 terrorist attack, wrote a “Letter to America” in which he explained his motivation behind the tragic event in American history. The fall of the Twin Towers, the strike at the Pentagon, the plane that crashed in the Pennsylvania field, and the thousands of innocent people injured or killed that day, drastically changed America. Yet, last month, bin Laden’s letter exploded across the internet, and many of the viewers praised what the terrorist had to say.

“I feel like I’m going through an existential crisis right now,” some said. Others read the propaganda and insisted they “will never look at life” or “this country the same.” I believe it goes without saying that terrorists do not and will never deserve sympathy. Yet, how easy is it for lies to be perceived as truth? And the rise of social media use (TikTok in this case), and the increasing message of wokeness, has only added to the spread of deception. So, these waves of ignorance continue.

A recent poll conducted by YouGov, although not the first of its kind, revealed one in five young American adults believe the Holocaust never happened. At least 30% of the respondents, ages 18 to 29, doubt the authenticity of the event, and about a quarter of this same group claimed the retelling of this historical account has been “exaggerated.”

In 2020, the first “50-state survey of Holocaust knowledge among millennials and Generation Z” was released, and the results showed a “lack of basic Holocaust knowledge.” If there was concern about how people viewed the Holocaust three years ago, it can’t be surprising that the concern has only grown worse — especially as history continues to unfold and our societal problems increase.

Anti-Semitism has grown to its highest percent in about three decades. Since the October 7 Hamas attacks on Israel, the question many are asking is, did the attacks spark this outburst in anti-Semitism, or did it expose what had already been building for some time?

While there’s much evidence to support the latter, this poll alone indicates that, in addition to young Americans not knowing much about the Holocaust or whether it happened, many of them have politicized the 1940s Jewish genocide. When analyzing the partisan differences, the survey demonstrated 26% of those who voted for Biden and 13% of those who voted for Trump in the 2020 election believe Israel “exploits Holocaust victimhood for its own purposes.” In other words, for some, the Holocaust is just another piece of propaganda meant to serve one party and degrade another. How unfortunate.

It’s also sad that some of America’s most prominent Ivy League school presidents won’t do anything about the anti-Semitism spreading on their campuses. Or that young Americans see no problem in calling for the eradication of the Jewish state and people. It’s hard to believe the hatred toward and rhetoric against the people of Israel has gone so far that the Hamas murderers, rapists, and brutal, stone-cold terrorists, have racked up support and sympathy.

It’s incredible that the Holocaust, where six million Jews were burned alive, starved, gassed to death, worked to death, tortured in concentration camps, ripped from their families, used as props for surgical experiments, and deprived of every basic human right known to man, has been forgotten or denied by many. Obviously, the word, “unfortunate,” does not do justice. But it’s not just “unfortunate” to forget the past. It’s dangerous, and is often driven by dangerous ideologies.

Meg Kilgannon, senior fellow for Education Studies at Family Research Council, commented to The Washington Stand, “This phenomenon is a strange combination of American youth being unchurched and uneducated.” She continued, “When people young or old are unaware of who the Jewish people are in salvation history, they will be unable to believe something like the Holocaust could happen to them or anyone else.”

Letting go of history by any means — be it misinterpretation, forgetfulness, purposeful politicization, or denial — means the future will be affected by it, and often not in a positive way. “The Marxist march through our institutions includes the church and the schools,” Kilgannon added. “And the result of this will not be a communist utopia, but rather a hellscape where terrorist attacks are normalized as ‘anticolonial.’”

She concluded, “You can only maintain such an insane narrative when historical events like the Holocaust are lost to history.”

AUTHOR

Sarah Holliday

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Poll: Americans Strongly Identify as Parents Despite Marriage Decline

“Almost 90% of the world’s population now live in countries with falling marriage rates,” CNBC declared recently. In the U.S. alone, marriage rates have decreased “by 60% since the 1970s.” In July, when that article was published, the primary factor in these declining rates centered around a declining economy. However, recent research shows there may be factors outside of valid economic concerns to why less people are getting married.

Deseret News released a poll on Tuesday that found, as marriage rates continue to drop, the rates “of people identifying as parents” remains steady. As reported by the Higher Ground Times, it appears “parenting is more central to [American] identity than being a spouse or partner.”

To get a more accurate read of the survey, however, it’s important to note the overall emphasis on marriage and parenting as it relates to political identity. Christopher F. Karpowitz, the survey’s coinvestigator and research director at Brigham Young University, mapped out the dichotomy between churchgoing Republicans and non-religious Democrats. He described the survey results as a worrisome sign of “culture war tensions.”

The report stated that churchgoing “Republicans argue that marriage is important, but they are far less willing to support families through government spending.” On the other hand, the report said Democrats “express support for public spending that supports families and children, but they have decided to leave arguably the most important institutional support for children off of their agenda: marriage.”

It concluded, “A true coalition for families is lurking out there, but it requires our key factions to give up some of their prejudices. Republicans would have to admit that what we support financially is a key measure of what we truly value. Democrats would have to admit that marriage is a positive good for people and children.”

Joseph Backholm, senior fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement at Family Research Council, shared with The Washington Stand, “The fact that there are partisan differences in how people view marriage … makes sense.” He continued, “The worldview of the Left devalues marriage for the same reason it values abortion and transgenderism — it values short-term personal happiness above familial or societal good.” Yet simultaneously, Backholm emphasized, “The more we value the long-term benefit of children and strong societies, the more value we will give to marriage.”

Ultimately, “The Right and the Left think differently about marriage because they have a different understanding of what produces strong people, family, and cultures,” he added. “The pursuit of immediate personal happiness above all else devalues marriage because marriage requires long-term commitment regardless of how we’re feeling about it today.” He discussed how it is a contradiction to a good family dynamic to be a great parent while also being a bad spouse or not having a spouse, since there is overwhelming evidence that a healthy marriage promotes healthy child development.

Backholm concluded, “The created order established, and social science has confirmed, that the ideal situation for children is in a home where they are loved by their mother and father. Marriage is good because marriage encourages this. The idea that we can separate parenting from marriage without significant consequences is in the same category as the belief that men can get pregnant.”

AUTHOR

Sarah Holliday

Sarah Holliday is a reporter at The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

New Speaker Mike Johnson Attacked for Believing Basic Christian Doctrine

On Wednesday, after three weeks of dysfunction following the ouster of former-Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), Rep. Mike Johnson of Louisiana was elected as the 56th Speaker of the House. Johnson’s elevation to the office caps a frenetic period in which Republicans considered multiple candidates before coalescing around the four-term congressman. Although Johnson’s unexpected rise to the speakership was welcomed by conservatives, the Left has predictably been apoplectic in denouncing Speaker Johnson’s long-standing social conservative views.

Although progressives routinely castigate those who hold convictions rooted in a biblical worldview, the sharp criticism directed toward the new speaker for his Christian faith is nonetheless revealing.

For example, some House Democrats took exception to the portion of Johnson’s speech on Wednesday in which the new speaker referenced God. “Welcome to the Republican Era of not even pretending they aren’t forcing their religion on Congress and the American people. This is a slippery, dangerous slope to theocracy,” warned Rep. Jared Huffman (D-Calif.). Another Democrat, Jamie Raskin, tweeted, “Speaker Mike Johnson? Anti-choice, anti-LGBTQ, anti-gun safety, anti-democracy. This is what theocracy looks like.”

Although allegations of Republicans wanting to install a theocracy are not new, the dire warnings of Huffman and Raskin, and the parroting of these claims by some in the media, reveal remarkable ignorance of basic Christian beliefs. Significantly, Johnson has said nothing about theocracy or forcing his religious beliefs on anyone. Rather, the new speaker simply articulated the commonplace Christian perspective that God providentially raises up leaders.

In his speech, Johnson stated, “I don’t believe there are any coincidences in a matter like this. I believe that Scripture, the Bible is very clear that God is the One that raises up those in authority. He raised up each of you, all of us. And I believe that God has ordained and allowed each one of us to be brought here for this specific moment and this time.”

Far from advocating for a theocratic takeover of the House of Representatives, Johnson’s comments merely reflect well-known biblical passages such as Daniel 2:21 which states, “He changes times and season; he removes kings and sets up kings; he gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to those who have understanding” and Psalm 22:28 where it says, “For kingship belongs to the Lord, and he rules over the nations.”

Other passages that affirm God’s role in raising up civil leaders include Isaiah 40:22-23, which says, “It is he who sits above the circle of the earth, and its inhabitants are like grasshoppers; who stretches out the heavens like a curtain, and spreads them like a tent to dwell in; who brings princes to nothing, and makes the rulers of the earth as emptiness.” Likewise, Proverbs 21:1 teaches “The king’s heart is a stream of water in the hand of the Lord; he turns it wherever he will.”

To put it simply, Johnson’s understanding that “God is the One that raises up those in authority” is a widely-held Christian belief that has been taught for centuries. The fact that articulating this basic conviction triggered ominous warnings of an impending theocracy demonstrates the ever-widening gulf between those with a biblical worldview and those without one.

Second, Johnson’s elevation to the speakership prompted scores of opposition researchers to investigate the congressman’s past writings and speeches for potentially damaging material. Johnson’s past comments on same-sex marriage, abortion, and homosexuality were immediately targeted. For example, within hours of Johnson’s election, CNN investigative reporters Andrew Kaczynski and Allison Gordon published a piece provocatively titled: “New speaker of the House Mike Johnson once wrote in support of the criminalization of gay sex.” According to the reporters, Johnson once supported an amendment to Louisiana’s constitution that defined marriage between a man and a woman.

Moreover, in a 2004 op-ed, Johnson described homosexual relationships as “inherently unnatural.” After mentioning other examples of Johnson’s purported extremism, the authors note, “Now, Johnson is the speaker of the House at a time when a majority of Americans are strongly supportive of gay rights.” Of course, CNN was not alone. Hours after his election, ABCNBCNew York TimesVanity Fair, and other outlets published stories that highlighted Johnson’s opposition to same-sex marriage.

On abortion, media outlets and Democratic campaign operatives seized on Johnson’s past statements. Politico noted that Johnson once served as a senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom, “the conservative legal powerhouse behind the case that overturned Roe v. Wade.” The article specifically highlighted the congressman’s support for a federal heartbeat law. Other criticism came from DNC Chair Jamie Harrison who released a statement describing Johnson as a “anti-abortion MAGA extremist.” Harrison also noted Johnson’s sponsorship of what he characterized as “an extreme abortion ban nationwide.” Sarah Posner, a contributor for MSNBC, also pointed to Johnson’s pro-life record as proof that he is the “most unabashedly Christian nationalist speaker in history.”

From a worldview perspective, the criticisms and denunciations of Johnson are predictable. We live in highly partisan times, and the reality is that whoever Republicans elevated to serve as Speaker of the House would be portrayed in the worst possible light. However, it is still significant that much of the initial criticism hurled at the new speaker overlaps with basic Christian convictions.

From the first century, Christians have affirmed the personhood of the unborn and opposed abortion. Likewise, Christians have believed marriage is the relationship between one man and one woman and taught that homosexual behavior is outside of God’s design and purpose for human sexuality. The fact that convictions held by Christians for millennia are now openly mocked and disparaged by so many speaks to the rapid secularization of the times.

The newly elected Speaker of the House Mike Johnson is a Southern Baptist who subscribes to the basic tenets of the Christian faith. Like tens of millions of Americans, Johnson’s views on a range of issues are informed by Scripture, science, and reason. Although the news media and opposition party are working overtime to convince the nation that Johnson is a “Christian nationalist” with outdated, subversive policy views, that characterization could not be further from the truth.

Johnson’s views are in line with an overwhelming percentage of American Christians who share the speaker’s worldview. As we will soon find out, this is good news for Republicans, but more importantly, good news for America at a time when convictional, principled leadership is sorely needed.

AUTHOR

David Closson

David Closson is Director of the Center for Biblical Worldview at Family Research Council.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

The Faults in ‘No-Fault’ Divorce

Jesus rejoiced in the institution of marriage. “He Who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate” (Matthew 19:4-6).

Note the phrases: “hold fast … one flesh … what God has joined … not separate.” Marriage is, in God’s good plan, unitive and permanent, a covenant made to last. While Jesus made an exception for infidelity, God’s word makes clear that marriage is composed of a relationship that is to be as secure as our salvation in Christ. Indeed, marriage is a picture of the union of Christ and His church (Ephesians 5:22-33).

In our culture, this beautiful union has been tarnished by the availability of penalty-free dissolution. On July 6, 1969, the state of California enacted the nation’s first “no-fault” divorce law. As the state’s judicial branch website explains, this means “no one has to prove someone did something wrong to cause the divorce (this is called no fault divorce). You can get a divorce even if the other person doesn’t want one.” This measure became law under the signature of then-governor Ronald Reagan, who later told his son Michael that signing it was “one of the worst mistakes of his political career.”

In 2010, New York became the last state to enact a no-fault divorce law; today, all 50 have some form of the law on the books. Making no-fault divorce available and inexpensive is like offering a child an endless supply of ice cream and soda: Given human fallenness, something accessible that is also seen as desirable will be common. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2021 there were 1,985,000 marriages in the United States and almost 690,000 divorces — almost exactly 35% of those who tied the knot.

In total, about half of first-time marriages end in divorce; subsequent marriages end at an even higher percentage. While the causes vary widely, ultimately no-fault divorce is a precipitating factor.

It has also become common. As National Review journalist Madeleine Kearns observes, we now have “widespread acceptance of ‘no fault divorce,’ the idea that marriage, like a car, sometimes spontaneously breaks down, becoming more hassle than it’s worth.” A disturbing but accurate metaphor. “The nation saw a spike in divorce rates following the enactment of no-fault divorce laws,” writes The Daily Signal’s Daniel Davis. “Between 1960 and 1980, the divorce rate more than doubled and remained relatively steady into the 1990s.”

At the same time, consider research by the University of Virginia’s Dr. Bradford Wilcox, who heads the National Marriage Project, that “active conservative Protestants,” or Evangelicals, “who attend church regularly are actually 35% less likely to divorce than those who have no religious preferences.” Also, in 2018, Harvard’s Human Flourishing Program published research collected over 14 years showing that “regular religious service attendance is associated with 50% lower divorce rates in later life.” So, while it’s good news that among regular churchgoers the divorce rate is lower, it is still high. And the costs of divorce for the couples involved, their children, and the culture at large are wide and deep. The scars left, especially on children, are large and enduring.

Christians need to pursue Christ-honoring marriages and there are many resources to help them; some can be found at FRC.org. With that said, while personal character is not the province of government, both Scripture and the Constitution emphasize the need to restrain the excesses of human fallenness. Penalizing adverse and destructive behavior is necessary for individuals and communities, even nations, to enjoy a high measure of stability and security. Along with this, nothing strengthens the foundation of any society more than healthy, robust families. So, what can government do, for the good of everyone, to create a cultural environment in which faithful marriage is encouraged?

Policies that bolster marriage are helpful. For example, the home mortgage deduction, the adoption tax credit, and the charitable tax deduction are among those that enable families to better pay their bills. But things like the so-called “Respect for Marriage Act,” which essentially said that marriage is whatever any state says it is, and no-fault divorce take away from whatever else government gives.

What is not helpful is a national policy in which divorce-at-will, or with modest qualifications, is now more the norm than not. Revising state divorce policy is a tough challenge; model legislation (which includes exceptions for such things as spousal abuse and abandonment) provides guidance but has yet to be enacted. It’s hard to curb people’s desire for an easy-out.

Perhaps the most effective remedy is for believers to model the kinds of marriages Jesus envisioned. As Christian men and women demonstrate the beauty of the lifelong, exclusive, covenantal commitment He taught, the attractiveness of the one-flesh union might well make marriage more attractive.

A final note: Theologically, there’s no such thing as a no-fault divorce. There is always at least one party morally responsible for violating something God never intended to be dissolved.

AUTHOR

Rob Schwarzwalder

Rob Schwarzwalder is Senior Lecturer in Regent University’s Honors College.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

5 Reasons You Must See ‘Sound of Freedom’

UPDATE: Statement by President Donald J. Trump after watching Sound of Freedom.


I really didn’t want to see this movie. Does anyone want to see a movie about horrific crimes against children and the systems that support or fail to stop child sex trafficking? But I felt an obligation to support “Sound of Freedom.” And I was happy to hear the buzz in the conservative media sphere. “Sound of Freedom” was making noise in all the right places.

So I bought my tickets online and told myself that I had at least done my duty to financially support this worthy cause. My seat was sold, and if it went unfilled, the movie theater would still make money. Despite my best efforts to be somewhere else, I found myself in the seat on July 4.

I still don’t quite understand how I left the theater feeling hopeful. I had expected to feel hopeless and disgusted after watching a movie about child sex trafficking. And there were certainly moments of those feelings during the course of the movie. But the power of art to move the human heart is very real, if hard to describe, even after experiencing it.

It’s also hard to describe a movie without spoiling the plot for others. Here are five impressions this movie left on me, and I hope they inspire you to see the movie.

1. “God’s children are not for sale.”

This is the motivation for the main character to move beyond the soul crushing work of tracking organized pedophile networks to rescuing their victims. “Sound of Freedom” made me reflect, once again, on the work we ask others to do in our name: policing, soldiering, guarding. It is hard work, mostly done by men, who lay down their lives to protect and serve others. We ask them to deal with many of the things we do not want to face. Many do this work because of a higher calling, one that needs our support in prayer.

2. “I feel like she’s my daughter.”

Mrs. Tim Ballard texts this message to her husband while he is away searching for a victim. Her love and support for him and his work is beautifully communicated in this movie. She is also asked to bear part of the burden her husband shoulders on our behalf. She represents a much larger group of people who deserve our gratitude and our prayers.

3. “I was that darkness.”

A man contemplates his role as a consumer in the adult sex industry. His redemption from direct involvement is by the grace of God. But this character made me think about what I could or should be doing to address this grave injustice against women and men, girls and boys. At a minimum, opposing the legalization of “sex work” would be a start. Removing pornography and pornographic content from school libraries and curricula is also imperative.

4. “You’re on your own, Tim.”

Government redress of grievances is limited. Tim Ballard, the main character, had to operate on his own to follow the call to protect God’s children. But as Christians we have an obligation to prove that Tim is not alone. Each of us is called to combat the sex industry, whether through promoting organizations like Covenant Eyes that guard against pornography, by speaking out against endeavors to normalize pedophilia, or simply by living a life that upholds the dignity of every male and every female as a human being — not objects for exploitation.

5. “Could you sleep if your child’s bed was empty?”

The plea of a father for his trafficked daughter. This theme was the main reason for my initial reluctance to see the film. And it was one of the reasons why, if I had to see it, I would see it in a theater. Hearing a question like that asked in a movie theater for me is very different from hearing it asked in my living room, with my own children’s beds right upstairs.

There are some movies to see and “leave” at the theater rather than experience them at home. But this movie is one to share with others, at a theater or at your church, or even in your home. While it is not for young children, this movie is a remarkable work of art about a horrific topic. I’m grateful to Angel Studios for distributing the movie, and I encourage you to see it. I am glad I did.

AUTHOR

Meg Kilgannon

Meg Kilgannon is Senior Fellow for Education Studies at Family Research Council.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Fathers Are Crucial to Healthy Outcomes for Kids, Studies Confirm

As the U.S. celebrated Father’s Day 2023, two recent studies confirm that fathers play a central role in the mental health and behavior of their children.

In a report that compared dozens of studies conducted between 1987 and 2022, the America First Policy Institute (AFPI) found “clear correlations between children raised in fatherless homes and developmental challenges ranging from bad grades, anxiety, and suicide to violent behavior, drug use, and criminality.”

The report pointed out the extent of fatherlessness in America, with 18.3 million children who currently live without a father in the home, or about one out of every four kids in the U.S. This statistic is at odds with the overwhelming consensus among Americans of the importance of strong families. A January 2022 Rasmussen poll found that 84% “believe a strong family is foundational to a strong America and that parents should bear the primary responsibility for raising children.” Only 11% said that raising children is a “community responsibility,” as suggested by President Joe Biden a few weeks ago.

Regarding educational outcomes, the study found that children with an engaged father in the home were “33% percent less likely to repeat a class and 43% more likely to get As in school.” It also found that children without fathers in the home were up to nine times more likely to drop out of school.

As to mental health outcomes, kids in single-parent families are “twice as likely to suffer from mental health and behavioral problems as those living with married parents” and have an almost “five times greater chance of developing mood disorders.” The report further pointed to studies showing that up to 63% of youth suicides and 85% of children who exhibit behavioral disorders are from fatherless homes.

Regarding criminal behavior, the report pointed to studies showing that “fatherless kids are 20 times more likely to be incarcerated,” with some data suggesting that children living without fathers “are 279% more likely to carry guns and deal drugs compared to peers living with their fathers.” The report also noted that in a study of 56 school shootings, 82% of the shooters “grew up in either an unstable family environment or grew up without both biological parents together.”

Joseph Backholm, senior fellow for Biblical Worldview and Strategic Engagement at Family Research Council, contended that there are serious societal consequences when children grow up with a lack of love from engaged fathers.

“When children are abandoned by their father, their little minds often conclude they are not worth loving,” he told The Washington Stand. “But that doesn’t mean they stop looking for love. Instead, they look to people who will pretend to love them, for a price. In other cases, children turn to substances to help numb the pain. Fatherlessness creates a deficit of love and a crisis of identity. The violence, substance abuse, crime, and educational failures seem to be the result of what happens when children look for love and identity in the wrong places.”

In addition, new studies in the world of neuroscience are continuing to uncover the critical importance of household stability for young children. In a groundbreaking study published in the June edition of Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, researchers analyzing how children’s brains develop have found that “household instability before age 5 increases the risk of depression by age 21.” The findings revealed that a stable father’s presence during early childhood, among other factors, “benefit long-term development of mental health and well-being.”

The AFPI report includes numerous recommendations on how to remedy the fatherhood crisis in America.

“Local churches and faith-based organizations can be of assistance in the entire fatherhood space,” it notes. “Churches are well situated to lead in this space, as they have the personnel and mentorship potential to guide fathers to their highest potential, provide community-based resources, and mentor those without fathers.”

The report goes on to maintain that “policy officials and community leaders alike can support an all-out pro-fatherhood messaging campaign to amplify the importance of fatherhood across the Nation.” As reported by Breitbart, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) is one lawmaker who has sought to pass legislation aimed at supporting families this year. “Never in my lifetime has it been harder to be a mom or a dad,” Rubio wrote in January. “Laws in our country should work to chart a new course and help parents balance child-rearing, work, and other priorities throughout day-to-day life.”

The AFPI report concludes, “To address this crisis, we must first speak openly about the problem of fatherless children. Then, we must focus on fixing it by promoting strong families, confronting cultural malaise, and sharing the joys of fatherhood. It is a tall task but a worthwhile one.”

AUTHOR

Dan Hart

Dan Hart is senior editor at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Top Reasons to Dump the ‘Fag Flag’ and Restore ‘Old Glory’ from the school house to the White House

I remember that each and every single day that I was in elementary, middle and high school holding my hand over my heart with my teacher and classmates reciting the Pledge of Allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the Republic, for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

I grew up loving my country. Each and every day I grew to love her more and more. Until the inauguration of Joseph Robinett Biden Jr.

Today young people seem to have forgotten America’s history, the basics of biology, and the science of DNA. It seems they feel comfortable, even devoted, to embracing myths like: America is racist, whites are supremacist, mankind can control the weather if we the people just submit to big government mandates, laws and regulations that take away our freedom of choices bit by bit and a male can identify as a female.

This has led to Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. flying the “Fag Flag” in front of the White House along with the American flag honoring pride month. BTW, remember that pride is one of the seven deadly sins.

Title 4, United States Code, Chapter 1, Paragraph 7 reads (c),

No other flag or pennant should be placed above or, if on the same level, to the right of the flag of the United States of America, except during church services conducted by naval chaplains at sea, when the church pennant may be flown above the flag during church services for the personnel of the Navy. No person shall display the flag of the United Nations or any other national or international flag equal, above, or in a position of superior prominence or honor to, or in place of, the flag of the United States at any place within the United States or any Territory or possession thereof: Provided, That nothing in this section shall make unlawful the continuance of the practice heretofore followed of displaying the flag of the United Nations in a position of superior prominence or honor, and other national flags in positions of equal prominence or honor, with that of the flag of the United States at the headquarters of the United Nations.

Joseph Robinette Biden Jr. has violated U.S. Code by flying the Fag Flag on the same level as the American Flag at the White House.

Reasons to Dump the Fag Flag

There are many reasons to dump the Fag Flag, including but not limited to:

  1. Remove the Fag Flag from the White House in accordance with Title 4, United States Code, Chapter 1, Paragraph 7 (c).
  2. In a video recently unearthed from 2019, Chasten Buttigieg, “husband” of Department of Transportation diversity hire Pete Buttigieg, is seen leading children in a pledge of allegiance to the Gay Pride flag. Buttigieg had the young children recite: “I pledge my heart to the rainbow of the not so typical gay camp, to the gay agenda for which it stands. One camp, full of pride, indivisible, with affirmation and equal rights for all.” Doing this harms children and grooms them for pedophiles and pederasts.
  3. The U.S. Air Force Twitter account posted a tweet celebrating pride month with an image of a soldier saluting the alphabet rainbow flag. Read some of the comments WOKE Air Force received on this official tweet they sent out. So bad that the U.S. Air Force shut off  all comments. This harms the health, welfare and morale of our men and women in the armed services. It is an existential threat to our national security.
  4. A Colorado school district encouraged its physical education (P.E.) teachers to don LGBT pride gear and use preferred pronouns in an effort to display their support for the LGBTQ community, according to documents obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation through a public records request. On March 8, a group of Jeffco Public Schools high school teachers were trained on how to make the district’s P.E. programs “even more inclusive,” where all students feel welcome regardless of their “race, ethnicity or sexual orientation,” according to a presentation obtained by the DCNF through a public records request. Teachers were trained to engage in “public visibility” by sporting some sort of rainbow pride gear such as a pin or t-shirt, plan or participate in pride events and practice using preferred pronouns. Having any teacher forced to don Fag Wear is both demeaning and a threat to the emotional health and well being of students.
  5. wrote, “It might be news to some, especially to the left’s useful idiots on the left and the right, but the “LGBT Pride movement” is a communist movement. Same with the “Black Lives Matter movement,” the “Feminist movement,” etc. Because a naked communist movement might wake up too many Americans, and leftists know that, they hide behind race, sex and sexuality to push communism…In sum, the LGBT movement is a gay communist movement that now expresses a triumphalist attitude about their position in 2023, where they moan about how “marginalized” they are, while shoving their lifestyle in our children’s faces. As one of these gay supremacists put it the other day, ‘Straight sex is just not natural. Those are biological facts.’ I would tell this gay supremacist that without natural straight sex, he and billions of people wouldn’t exist.” Communism is anti-American.
  6. Jim Hoft, on September 24, 2022 reported, “Earlier this week investigative journalist Christopher Rufo reported on the teacher’s union promoting how-to guides on ‘anal sex’ and ‘fisting’ to children. This is shocking news to most Americans that the nation’s largest teachers’ union is promoting such material to America’s children. “It All Started with Obama: Barack Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar” Pushed Books that Encouraged Children to Meet Adults at Gay Bars for Sex”>But this trend of perversion did not start during the Joe Biden regime. Back in January 2010, The Gateway Pundit reported on Obama’s “Safe Schools Czar” Kevin Jennings. “Safe Schools Czar” Kevin Jennings and his organization GLSEN was encouraging children to meet adults in gay bars for sex. From our 2010 report: This story just gets freakier and weirder and the fact that the mainstream media completely ignores this dangerous man working in the Office of Safe and Drug-free Schools makes the story even more scandalous. You’d think the AP could peel away a few of its reporters from Going Rogue to investigate this radical czar. This avoidance by the democratic-media complex won’t keep us from reporting the truth. Our goal of protecting children is greater than our desire to protect a political party. Kevin Jennings’ was the founder, and for many years, Executive Director of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN) until he left his post in 2008. GLSEN maintains a recommended reading list of books for children that the radical organization believes all kids should be reading. The books on the list promote all kinds of radical ideas from child rape, to first graders having sex to the joys of prostitution. Recently it was discovered that these books were not only on GLSEN’s reading list but that Kevin Jennings personally promoted several of these books during his career. One of the books he promoted encouraged children to go to gay bars for sex with adults to see if they like it.
  7. One of the queerest myths is the use of the Fag Flag by the LGBTQ+ community to symbolize pride and equality. The truth is that the Fag Flag rainbow was created by God after the great flood and first seen by Noah and his family. The rainbow in the clouds was a symbol of hope that civilization would begin anew in His Image. Genesis 9: 15-17 read, “[A]nd I will remember my covenant with you and with all living creatures. Never again will the floodwaters destroy all life. When I see the rainbow in the clouds, I will remember the eternal covenant between God and every living creature on earth.” Then God said to Noah, “Yes, this rainbow is the sign of the covenant I am confirming with all the creatures on earth.”
  8. A Professor from Bethlehem College & Seminary named Dieudonné Tamfu wrote in a July 18th, 2015 article titled What Does the Rainbow Mean for Gays?, What do you think of when you see the rainbow flag? Most likely, you think of homosexuality or the wider LGBT movement. Gilbert Baker, the man credited with pioneering the celebratory rainbow flag flying over the gay movement, recently lauded his craft, noting that it’s something beautiful. He answers those who think it’s not, saying, “The rainbow’s in the Bible. It’s a covenant between God and all living creatures.” According to Baker, the God of the Bible knows the struggle of gays and lesbians, and that is where he finds hope. God does indeed know the internal and social battles of gays and lesbians, but the question is, Does he approve of their practice? Would God approve of their use of the rainbow to symbolize this movement? The Supreme Court’s decision on gay “marriage” has made the rainbow symbol ubiquitous. Those who celebrate so-called same-sex marriage are painting social media with rainbow colors. Even the White House was lit up the with red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and purple. God designed the rainbow to symbolize something far greater and far more glorious than homosexuality, and if those in the homosexual community truly understood and embraced the symbol they are waving in their hands, they would experience true freedom and peace. [Emphasis added] Read more. The Fag Flag is anti-Muslim, Christian and Jew.

But there are rays of hope.

The Bottom Line

ChurchMilitant.com reported,

The U.S. ambassador to Poland has become embroiled in the battle between militant homosexual campaigners and traditionalist Catholics after tweeting her support for the gay lobby on Thursday, as anti-Catholic blasphemy by LGBT activists continues to escalate before the fall general elections.

Over 30 town councils in Poland declared themselves “free from LGBT ideology” after anti-Catholic LGBT parades blasphemed the Blessed Sacrament and the icon of the Black Madonna and Warsaw’s mayor signed a pro-LGBT declaration in February calling for gay sex education in schools.

[ … ]

Swidnik councillor Radoslaw Brzozka said his town issued its anti-LGBT statement in response to Warsaw’s declaration, which was “against good moral values.”

“Let children have a father and a mother, not such deviations. Otherwise there will be fewer and fewer children, and Poland will shrink,” 83-year-old Teresa Drzewiecka, who witnessed Nazis and Communists battling for control of her town Swidnik, told Reuters.

Tom Perkins, from the Guardian on June 17, 2023 reported,

In 2015, many liberal residents in Hamtramck, Michigan, celebrated as their city attracted international attention for becoming the first in the United States to elect a Muslim-majority city council.

They viewed the power shift and diversity as a symbolic but meaningful rebuke of the Islamophobic rhetoric that was a central theme of then Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump’s campaign.

This week many of those same residents watched in dismay as a now fully Muslim and socially conservative city council passed legislation banning Pride flags from being flown on city property that had – like many others being flown around the country – been intended to celebrate the LGBTQ+ community.

Muslim residents packing city hall erupted in cheers after the council’s unanimous vote, and on Hamtramck’s social media pages, the taunting has been relentless: “Fagless City”, read one post, emphasized with emojis of a bicep flexing.

The Washington Stand’s Ben Johnson on June 20, 2023 reported,

In the latest sign the LGBT agenda is losing support, the number of people who view same-sex relationships as “morally acceptable” tumbled last year — a sign “people are beginning to connect the dots” between legalizing same-sex marriage and indoctrinating schoolchildren in the LGBT agenda, a prominent pro-family leader says.

Overall, support for homosexual relationships fell this year by 7%, the largest decrease of any of the moral issued posed by Gallup pollsters in their annual Values and Beliefs poll, conducted each May. In 2023, 63% of Americans say they see nothing wrong with “gay or lesbian relations.” Fewer Republicans and Democrats said they found homosexual relations morally neutral this year.

“People are beginning to connect the dots between these agendas,” said Family Research Council President Tony Perkins on “Washington Watch” Monday. “We were told all this is just about live and let live, just being able to marry the one you love.” Disengaged voters “didn’t realize that it was going to involve the indoctrination of their children, the infiltration of every media outlet in America,” or that “different professions will be forced to affirm these same-sex unions” or go out of business.

It’s time for America like Hamtramck, Michigan to become a “Fagless” nation.

The first step on the road to reality would be taking down every Fag Flag in every classroom, board room, and from the school house to the White House.

Then purge media centers and school curriculum K-24 of all references to Fags and their Communist ideology.

Finally, The Washington Stand’s Ben Johnson reported,

Americans who identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual are far more likely to suffer from major depression, abuse illegal drugs, and are up to six times as likely to attempt suicide, according to a new report from the Biden administration. Although the report admits it cannot “explain the reasons” for these differences, it opens by blaming LGBT “invisibility and erasure” — a leap critics say is “just bad science” that obscures the real causes for their mental distress.

Adults who have sex with members of the same sex, or both sexes, experience a dramatically lower quality of life across numerous measures, the Biden administration reveals. Women who have sex with members of both sexes (bisexuals) were six times as likely to have attempted suicide within the last year as women who identify as straight, and three times as likely to abuse opioid drugs. Bisexual men were three times as likely to have had a serious mental illness in the last year, according to the survey from the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA).

“A higher prevalence of substance use and mental health issues has been well-documented among people who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual (also referred to as sexual minorities) than among those who identify as heterosexual or straight,” notes the report, which focuses on American adults’ behaviors during the 2021-2022 year.

Time to save the children before they become fags to keep them from abusing drugs, preventing their mental illnesses and stop the suicides.

As for corporate CEOs across America warning, go Fagless or your company goes broke. Hey, Bud Light did you get the message to go Fagless?

©2023. Dr. Rich Swier. All rights reserved.

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‘Boycott Target’ Rap Hits Number 1 on iTunes

Patriot Rappers Discuss How Their Song ‘Boycott Target’ Skyrocketed to the Top of the Charts.

For those who didn’t know about the Target controversy already, they likely know now.

Forgiato Blow, nicknamed “Trump’s Nephew,” released a song about boycotting Target last week, and it is rapidly climbing the charts. Blow’s music video has at least 705,000 views on YouTube, and the song has been growing in popularity ever since its reveal. “Boycott Target” was ranked #1 for top songs according to iTunes Top 10 Music Charts U.S.A. and has been a headliner in the news this week.

“Boycott Target” was released as a response to Target’s inclusion of LGBTQ products and partnership with a Satanist designer earlier in May. There was a firestorm of backlash from conservatives. Many were upset at the inclusion of over-sexualized ideas in children’s books and children’s clothing. The idea of boycotting Target went viral on social media, and many well-known conservatives have championed the revolt.

Forgiato Blow is an American rapper who has written many songs to demonstrate his love for Donald Trump, America, and conservative ideals. He saw the Target controversy as an opportunity for a hit single, and he took it. Some of his song lyrics include, “Target is targeting your kids” and “We need a clean up on every aisle, inside this store Satan resides.” The music video is filmed inside of the department store, while Blow and other featured artists wave the controversial items at the camera, clearly articulating their views on the products.

While the uproar has been ongoing in the limelight for a few weeks now, this hit song has likely brought attention to a wider, younger audience. A recent Forbes study shows that 94% of Gen Z survey respondents say that music is important to their lives. In that same study, 40% say that music plays a role in shaping their social circle.

“Now that sites have ‘trending’ features, it’s an easy way for the same ideas to be planted in all our heads at the same time,” Zach Sprouse, Regent University student and Family Research Council intern says. “In a way, it’s a good idea to reach Gen Z through trending songs and posts, because most young people are way more likely to listen to the #1 song of the day rather than turn on the news.”

So, is it beneficial for politics to merge with modern arts to impress different ideas? Studies show that this is already happening. “We ought to just embrace it and use trending features to spread our objectives,” Sprouse concludes. Music and the arts are highly influential in modeling our perception of the world. Artists like Forgiato Blow understand the ripple effect of their music and will most likely continue pushing agendas in their work in the future.

AUTHOR

Baylie McClafferty

RELATED ARTICLE: Target and Kohl’s Face Greater Backlash for Funding an Organization That Promotes Child Mutilation

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Exiled Cuban Journalist: ‘Socialism Is Institutionalized Envy’

Approximately 36% of young Americans, ages 18 to 22, hold a positive view of socialism. However, for exiled Cuban journalist Yoe Suárez, this positive view of socialism is not based on reality. On a recent episode of the Outstanding podcast hosted by Joseph Backholm, Suárez and Washington Stand Editor-in-Chief Jared Bridges discuss their firsthand experiences with socialism and its wide-ranging consequences.

“The first time I ate a tangerine in years was here in [the] USA,” Suárez said. “It’s amazing because Cuba is a tropical island, you know? It should have fruits there. That’s an image that can maybe portray what’s happening in Cuba.” Suárez went on to discuss the various crises Cubans endure, including blackouts, inaccessible medicine, and a lack of necessities like food and milk for families. When Backholm asked Suárez what the government’s objective was, he replied, “The principal goal is political control. And then they have to build a narrative of goodness behind that.”

Bridges shared his experience living under a socialist government in Minsk, Belarus. “At the time, the things I ran into was just seeing how that system for that long a time oppressed people,” he said. He discussed his inability to find prescribed medicine after going to seven different pharmacies. “To put it in perspective today, here in America, I’ll go to the drug store and get upset if I have to wait 15 minutes.” Bridges further noted that his experience shed light on how, rather than everyone being equal in their belongings and opportunities under socialism, people are stripped of basic needs including medicine. “What became evident to me was that something is not what it says it is,” Bridges stated.

Backholm wondered how to change the phenomenon happening “here in the United States where you have a growing number of young people who actually seem enthusiastic about socialism,” with Bridges adding how this enthusiasm takes place amongst Christians as well.

“The saddest thing is that socialism takes a lot from envy,” Suárez said. People want what they can’t have, and, for Suárez, socialism feeds the flame of envy toward those who have more. “Socialism is institutionalized envy. It’s that. Socialism is just that.” He went on to observe that the fundamental issue is when too much power is centralized in one place. Sharing is good, but it must come from a place of voluntary charity. As Suárez stated, “If it’s voluntary, it’s charity. And charity is good.” But as Backholm added, “Compelled generosity is not generosity, it is theft. It is totalitarian. It is robbery.”

Backholm further pointed out how our sinful nature, whether living under capitalism or socialism, leads to the exploitation of others and often manifests into greed. “If our hearts are unregulated, we will take advantage of other people to our own benefit,” Backholm stated. “What a biblical worldview argues for is a decentralization of power. … The free marketplace, by nature, decentralizes power.” In response, Bridges reflected on how a free market society also gives us the ability to speak out.

When the discussion turned to equality, it was noted that the desire for ultimate equality does not have an end because nothing will ever be enough to satisfy. Suárez, for instance, was kicked out of his home country for speaking out against socialism. As Bridges pointed out, this socialist view of equality does not lead to actual equality, but rather a totalitarian sense of political control where the government tells you what you can and cannot do with your goods, needs, and opinions.

For Backholm, Suárez, and Bridges, the ability to distinguish between voluntary charity and compelled generosity is the difference between socialism and capitalism. Neither is without flaw, but as Suárez stated, “The solution to a headache is not cancer.”

AUTHOR

Sarah Holliday

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Tucker Carlson Out at Fox News Days After Asking Americans to Wage Spiritual Warfare, Pray for Our Country

Fox News Channel announced it cut ties with the top-rated host in cable news, Tucker Carlson, on Monday, just days after he gave a widely praised speech imploring leaders to pray that God will preserve America from the progressive movement’s “evil” agenda.

Promoting transgender surgeries for minors and describing abortion as a good thing are “manifestations of some larger force” exerting its nefarious influence over us, he said over the weekend. Fox’s announcement, which removed Carlson’s reliably populist-conservative voice from the increasingly moderate network’s schedule, caused the corporation’s stock to tank by more than half-a-billion dollars.

“FOX News Media and Tucker Carlson have agreed to part ways. We thank him for his service to the network as a host and prior to that as a contributor,” said a press release from Fox News Channel. Neither the network nor Carlson disclosed the reason for the abrupt contract cancellation. The host did not get to give his audience a farewell broadcast. “Mr. Carlson’s last program was Friday April 21st,” said the release. Carlson’s Friday episode discussed the Nashville shooter’s still-unreleased manifesto, the longstanding Obama-Biden plan to establish permanent Democratic power by moving low-income people into suburbia, America’s uncontrolled border with Mexico, and the mysterious meaning of the “plus” in “LGBTQIA+.” Carlson closed the show by eating pizza with local hero Tyler Morrell, a delivery man who tripped a criminal suspect eluding police.

“Tucker Carlson Tonight” ended its six-and-a-half-year run as the highest-rated show in all cable news with an average of 3.39 million viewers. Even in his departure, Carlson outperformed his competitors, as his exit from Fox News drew far more headlines than CNN’s decision to fire low-rated 17-year host Don Lemon the same day.

Carlson’s eponymous primetime show has featured exclusive footage of the January 6 Capitol riot, reports from a Chinese whistleblower that COVID-19 originated inside China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology, and proof that prisons released hundreds of violent criminals thanks to the First Step Act. He also invited guests who did not agree with his conservative views to discuss the transgender movement’s grooming of children, oppose current or potential wars, and expose Deep State censorship.

Carlson and frequent guest Jason Whitlock increasingly analyzed political problems through a spiritual lens. Earlier this month, Carlson said, “Transgenderism is this country’s fastest growing religion.” Transgender ideologues “believe that they themselves are God with the power to control nature” by changing their gender by taking careful thought.

Tucker Carlson’s analysis turned especially prophetic shortly after his last show Friday night, when he gave the keynote address at the Heritage Foundation’s 50th anniversary gala. The political debate had shifted radically since 1991, when he got his first job as the copy editor of Heritage’s quarterly publication, Policy Review, for $14,000 a year. At that time, think tanks engaged in fact-based debates over mutually shared goals: for instance, whether Keynesian or Austrian economics created maximum prosperity. “I don’t think we’re watching a debate over how to get to the best outcome,” he said.

Today, the progressive political movement promotes laws allowing surgeons to “sexually mutilate children … I don’t think anyone could defend that as a positive outcome, but the weight of the government and a lot of corporate interests are behind that,” he said.

Similarly, in the Clinton era, Democrats portrayed abortion as a necessary evil. “But if you’re telling me abortion is a positive good, what are you saying? Well, you’re arguing for child sacrifice, obviously,” he said. “That’s like an Aztec principle.”

“None of this makes sense in conventional political terms,” he said. When political leaders embrace “destruction for its own sake … what you’re watching is not a political movement; it’s evil.”

“Those ideas won’t produce outcomes that any rational person would want under any circumstances. Those are manifestations of some larger force acting upon us,” Carlson said.

Carlson noted his spiritual insight is hampered by his background in the liberal Episcopal Church USA. “I’m an Episcopalian, so don’t take any theological advice from me, because I don’t have any. I grew up in the shallowest faith tradition ever invented,” Carlson said. “It’s not even a Christian religion at this point, I say with shame.” Yet his views derive equally from the Christian tradition and classical Athenian notions of the good, the true, and the beautiful. “Good is characterized by order, calmness, tranquility, peace … lack of conflict, cleanliness.” Evil “is characterized by their opposites: violence, hate, disorder, division, disorganization, and filth.”

“If you are all in on the things that produce the latter basket of outcomes, what you’re really advocating for is evil,” Carlson said. “I’m not calling for a religious war, far from it. I’m merely calling for an acknowledgement of what we’re watching.”

Carlson described the spiritual power that emanates from following God’s commandments. “The truth is contagious,” and “the second you decide to tell the truth about something, you are filled with this power from somewhere else,” he said. “The more you tell the truth, the stronger you become.” Entertaining lies, and “Drug and alcohol use are the same way: They make you weak and afraid.”

Carlson then hailed those who would not engage in the pageantry of sharing their pronouns for faith-based reasons. “I’m not doing that. It’s a betrayal of what I think is true. It’s a betrayal of my conscience, of my faith, of my sense of myself, of my dignity as a human being, of my autonomy.”

“I am not a slave. I am a free citizen, and I’m not doing that,” Carlson said, likening their steadfast obedience to the Apostle “Paul on trial.”

In a heartfelt moment, Carlson shared how he “was overcome a little bit with emotion” during a prayer offered by Fr. Paul Scalia, the son of late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, which convicted him of an oversight in his patriotic duties. “I don’t pray enough for the country, and I should,” Carlson said. “We all should be.”

He closed his speech by exhorting his audience to set aside a substantial block of time to pray for the United States. “Maybe we should all take like 10 minutes a day to say a prayer about” America’s future. “I’m saying that to you not as some kind of an evangelist. I’m literally saying that to you as an Episcopalian. … and even I have concluded it might be worth taking just 10 minutes out of your busy schedule to say a prayer for the future, and I hope you will,” he concluded.

Before the news of Carlson’s departure from Fox broke, Christians hailed the spiritual content of Carlson’s Heritage speech. “He is so spot on! God bless him for his clarity and his courage,” said Christian talk show host Janet Parshall. “He understood we are in a war between good and evil — and dared to say so,” noted evangelical Christian author and talk show host Eric Metaxas.

During a question-and-answer session immediately after the speech, Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts told Carlson, “If things go South at Fox News, there’s always a job for you at Heritage.”

It is not known whether Carlson’s call to spiritual warfare preceded or followed his departure from the network, or whether it influenced the Monday morning announcement. FNC renamed Carlson’s show “Fox News Tonight,” which will be filled by a rotating series of guest hosts until the network names a permanent anchor — a decision that drew international condemnation.

“Tucker Carlson is irreplaceable. This will hurt Fox News,” predicted UK politician and Brexit leader Nigel Farage.

The stock market soon confirmed his words. Within hours of the announcement, Fox Corp. stock tumbled by 5.4%, trimming approximately $1 billion from the company’s value, before leveling out to 2.9%, for a $507 million loss. The plunge reportedly reduced 92-year-old executive chairman Rupert Murdoch’s net worth by $182 million.

But it cheered the hearts of Carlson’s more implacable foes, including numerous Democratic elected officials who had called for the network, or the government, to suppress Carlson. Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said “our democracy depends on” Murdoch deciding to “stop Tucker Carlson from going on” his network. Over the weekend his colleague, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), called for harsher “federal regulation in terms of what’s allowed on air and what isn’t,” accusing “Tucker Carlson and some of these other folks on Fox” of unspecified “incitement of violence.”

Fox News’s rift with Tucker Carlson came four days after the network announced it had also parted ways with Dan Bongino — the latest in a number of lurches the network has made to the left since the ascension of Rupert Murdoch’s son, Lachlan Murdoch, and especially after former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (who once voted for the anti-conscience Employment Non-Discrimination Actjoined Fox News’s board of directors in 2019. The network has since platformed such social liberals as former Democratic campaign strategist Donna Brazile, UK presenter Piers Morgan, and former men’s Olympic decathlon gold medalist Bruce Jenner, who now identifies as female and changed his name to Caitlin Jenner.

The drift evidenced itself in Fox’s news coverage, as well. As part of Fox News’s celebration of Pride Month last June, “America’s Newsroom” anchor Dana Perino introduced a story on celebrating parents who began presenting their five-year-old daughter in public as a boy. The Whittington family showed “extraordinary courage” in transitioning their preschooler based on their “conservative faith,” said reporter Bryan Llenas, adding, “People are afraid of what they do not understand.” Fox News has also parroted pro-abortion rhetoric in its news coverage of late-term abortion.

“For a while Fox News has been moving to become establishment media, and Tucker Carlson’s removal is a big milestone in that effort,” said rival Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy.

Senators and members of Congress weighed in on the latest programming shake-up. “Could a new network emerge featuring (among others) @TuckerCarlson & @dbongino?” asked Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) on his personal Twitter account. Rep. Andy Biggs (R-Ariz.) praised both men as “true trailblazers amid a period where American corporate media controls speech.”

Carlson has yet to speak publicly on the matter or announce his next steps. Glenn Beck, himself a former Fox News host, offered to pay Carlson “a bucketful of money” to take a job at The Blaze. “You won’t miss a beat, and together, the two of us will tear it up,” he promised.

Carlson recently shared his increasingly critical view of the mainstream news media, which he said intentionally denied Americans access to the information necessary to become effective citizens.

“The media are part of the control apparatus,” Carlson told the “Full Send” podcast. “Their job is not to inform you. They are working for the small group of people who actually run the world. They’re their servants and their Pretorian Guard, and we should treat them with maximum contempt, because they have earned it.”

Carlson’s supporters hope he will return to another platform soon — and that Americans will take up his charge to pray for our country in the meantime. “We need to turn to God as a nation, in every way that we can, with everything in us,” Metaxas added. “It is genuinely our only hope.”

Jonathan Cahn, the author of “The Return of the Gods,” did not immediately return this reporter’s request for comment.

AUTHOR:

Ben Johnson

Ben Johnson is senior reporter and editor at The Washington Stand.

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Patriotic Reboot Doesn’t Change Bud Light’s Sobering Outlook

It’s Public Relations 101. When you’re getting hammered by critics, distract. If you can’t change the narrative, try changing the subject. Unfortunately, that trick doesn’t always work, as the big cheeses at Anheuser-Busch are quickly learning. After the worst two weeks in the company’s 171-year history, CEO Brendan Whitworth did his best “Hey, look over here!” moment. But it, like their low-level decision to debase women and alienate core consumers, bombed.

Any other time, the iconic Clydesdales galloping across picturesque American landmarks would have been a slam dunk. Until recently, the patriotic shots of couples waving their flags or women pledging allegiance would’ve been considered “on brand” for any Budweiser ad. Now, customers see it for what it is: a non-apology apology from a company that thinks slapping the stars and stripes on a commercial will help people forget they made a mockery of women to sell beer.

Or not sell beer, as the case may be. “Steep” doesn’t begin to describe the cost of partnering with Dylan Mulvaney, Hollywood’s favorite dress-wearing son. Since plastering cans with his pitiful imitation of Audrey Hepburn, Anheuser-Busch has lost a whopping $6 billion in market capitalization — ironically turning the beer into the “out of touch” “brand in decline” that Bud’s millennial managers claimed they were avoiding.

Their refusal to read the room is forcing Whitworth to pivot, as even the GOP presidential candidates take turns making Bud Light the butt of every joke. Entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy seized the moment to introduce “Bud Right” koozies. “There are *two* genders,” the Strive Asset Management co-founder tweeted. “Men are men & women are women. Don’t apologize for the truth.”

Fellow 2024 hopeful and Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) took aim with a killer parody of Bud Light’s “Real Men of Genuis” ad series of the early 2000s. In it, he shows a series of trans-identifying athletes like Lia Thomas with a stinging voiceover: “Once mediocre in the men’s division, now cream of the crop in the women’s. You couldn’t cut it with the boys, so you pushed women off the podium. Because without you, sports would be fair. Without you, women’s sports would be for, well, women.”

And instead of walking back the deal that has country musicians shooting cases of his beer and smashing cans on stage, Whitworth released a nothing burger statement about “never intend[ing] to be a part of a discussion that divides people. We are in the business of bringing people together over a beer.” Ironically, that is something the company managed to accomplish, as a clear majority unite around the decision not to support the brand.

When Rasmussen asked Americans about the debacle this week, more than half (54%) said they supported boycotting Anheuser-Busch. Only 30% were opposed, and 16% were unsure. “…[I]t’s pretty clear they stepped in a hornets’ nest,” Rasmussen’s Mark Mitchell said.

Meanwhile, almost comically, Democrats set out to prove that a beer that shills for transgenderism is just fine with them. In what many are calling the “most cringe” photo op ever, Reps. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), Mark Takanko (D-Calif.), Judy Chu (D-Calif.), and Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) forced a picture where all of them are enjoying conveniently posed Bud Lights. As candids go, it was a bust. “How convenient that all of the labels are facing the camera,” The Daily Caller’s Kay Smythe jabbed. It’s also “so strange that no one is talking but everyone is smiling.” And “why is there literally no one else in the photo? Oh, because it’s staged, of course!” she mocked.

Of course, Democrats have been willing sycophants of this transgender absurdity since day one. Republicans, if they’re smart, will stay on course, leaning into the outrage of the American people. This idea that the GOP and groups like the National Republican Congressional Committee should back off their attacks, when the American people are with them, is ludicrous. So what if the company is a major donor? If April’s freefall is any indication, they won’t have much money to give.

As the GOP’s conquering hero of corporate activism urged, no conservative should be lifting a finger to help Bud Light. “I mean, honestly,” DeSantis said, “that’s like them rubbing our faces in it. And… [if] these companies that do this, if they never have any response, they’re just gonna keep doing it.” This is not a one-off, he argued. “[I]t’s part of a larger thing where corporate America is trying to change our country, trying to change policy, trying to change culture. You know, I’d rather be governed by ‘We the people’ than woke companies. So I think pushback is in order across the board.”

Family Research Council’s Meg Kilgannon agreed. On “Washington Watch” Monday, she insisted that the only way corporate America will quit “marching to the beat of the leftist drum” is if “we make it hard on their bottom line. And if we don’t continue this pressure, then [that will be] difficult.”

Anheuser-Busch’s latest ad ended by saying, “This is a story that’s bigger than beer.” The same could be said here. As FRC President Tony Perkins pointed out on “Washington Watch,” “…[C]orporate America has become intoxicated with this woke agenda. … It impacts the Anheuser-Busch Corporation and all the other corporations [watching] this happening. So they have to take note. … In this case, it would be good for people to fall off the Budweiser wagon.”

AUTHOR

Suzanne Bowdey

Suzanne Bowdey serves as editorial director and senior writer at The Washington Stand.

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Jean-Pierre Responds To Outrage Over Bud Light’s Partnership With Dylan Mulvaney

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EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Society-Wide Lack of Restraint a Cause of Mass Shootings: Mohler

Only two weeks after the Covenant School shooting in Nashville, another mass murderer killed six people and wounded nine at a shooting at Old National Bank in Louisville, Ky. The incident was “absolutely horrifying and frightening,” Dr. Al Mohler, president of Southern Theological Seminary in Louisville, said on “Washington Watch,” but that should make it a call to action for Christians.

Mohler, whose predecessor’s son-in-law died in the Louisville shooting, diagnosed the tragedy as a symptom of “restraint being lifted off” of American society; “you see it just about in every dimension of life.” “Washington Watch” guest host Jody Hice said that “it seems like almost daily something like this is taking place,” these “extreme acts of violence taking place across the country.”

“There’s only one explanation for this, and that is premeditated violence carried out with a murderous rampage. There is no other factor here,” said Mohler. He warned against the attempts of secular society to reduce a mass shooter’s moral culpability to either socioeconomic factors or mental infirmity; neither explanation, he argued, applied in this case. “Many people want to reduce all sin and wrongdoing, even criminal behavior to some kind of socioeconomic explanation,” he added. “That’s basically all a secular society has.”

But Mohler said the real root cause is the same affliction we all suffer from. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” said the Lord through Jeremiah (17:9). “If it turns out someone says this is ‘just this’ or ‘just that,’ I think we as Christians know that is not plausible,” Mohler summarized.

“As we’re watching more of these events take place all across the country,” Hice agreed, “we can’t blame it all on guns. We can’t blame it all on mental issues. There is a heart issue that must at some point be addressed.”

“When you look at … both the Old and the New Testaments, there’s plenty of evidence to the fact that one of God’s great gifts to humanity is restraint. And when those restraints are taken off of a society, horrible things happen,” Mohler continued. “When you look at the entire structure of biblical morality and biblical law, if you begin to unravel things over here, the unraveling is going to take place over [t]here as well.”

After recounting how a Sodom-esque crime unraveled into civil war, the book of Judges concludes, “In those days there was no king in Israel. Everyone did what was right in his own eyes” (21:25). David’s last words poetically celebrate restraining authority, “When one rules justly over men, ruling in the fear of God, he dawns on them like the morning light, like the sun shining forth on a cloudless morning, like rain that makes grass to sprout from the earth” (2 Samuel 23:3-4). Paul wrote, “Rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad. Would you have no fear of the one who is in authority? Then do what is good, and you will receive his approval, for he is God’s servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword in vain” (Romans 13:3-4).

For decades, Americans “have been unraveling the entire moral fiber, the moral structure of Western civilization … that’s based upon very clear biblical principles of morality,” Mohler went on. “Eventually, you end up with people who basically demonstrate what it looks like for a restraint to be gone, for inhibitions to be gone, and for people to follow example after example of horrifying behavior. … If God’s restraining grace is taken away from a society, the list of horrible things happening just continues.”

Mohler insisted the “break down of order and … restraint” is “not just in terms of giant crimes,” but it “gets all the way down to the way parents deal with children, the way that the schools deal with students. … Frankly, you look at America’s major cities, [and] you don’t see much restraint about anything.” Paul warned that “in the last days … people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God” (2 Timothy 3:1-4).

Mohler said the digital revolution and especially social media was instrumental in creating the conditions for people to cast off restraint. “It used to be that people were told, ‘think before you say something. Take responsibility for your words. Don’t say anything you don’t want to live with the rest of your life,’” he said. But now, “it’s an unmitigated … just sheer express. It is just absolute, uncontrolled, rampag[ing] emotion.”

Hice agreed, “It’s so easy just to throw out emotions” on social media. “And that certainly is fuel to the fire of extremism and whatever other isms we want to talk about.”

Given the societal ills we face, “we do not have a toolkit of policies with which to respond to this,” explained Mohler. “We as Christians understand that there is no solution for the basic problem of the human heart that comes from within ourselves, or that can be arranged by society. … Policies and laws? They can suppress, to some extent, the full expression of human evil. But the problem is in the heart and the only solution for the problem in the heart is the gospel of Jesus Christ.”

So, “what we have is the good news of the gospel of Jesus Christ,” Mohler said. “The gospel of Jesus Christ is first and foremost about how sinners are saved from our sin through the blood atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ and the full justification of sins that comes to those who, by faith, come to know the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior.”

This means that “we have to return to first principles biblically,” Mohler argued. “We as Christians don’t have anywhere else to go anyway. The Christian church doesn’t have some kind of ‘policy exit’ from theology. … The New Testament gives us our agenda, that is, to preach the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, to build godly families, to build churches, and through that, to help bear witness to Christ.”

“But the larger society benefits by the presence of Christians and by the influence of Christianity,” Mohler added, because Christians “also have the sure biblical knowledge that the way you build a civilization is with healthy marriages based in a mother and a father and a husband and a wife who love each other and are devoted to each other; having children and raising them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord; building a society, a civilization based upon consistency with God’s law and God’s command; and seeking human flourishing in such a way that we know can only come by obedience to the Word of God and can only come by God blessing and providing restraint and protection.”

“As we look at a more radically secularizing society, it’s not just a challenge to us evangelistically,” said Mohler.” It’s a challenge to us just with the breakdown we see in the order around us.” Proverbs states, “Where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint, but blessed is he who keeps the law” (29:18).

“The answer for Christians has to come back to the gospel of Jesus Christ and our eager witness to the fact that there is no rescue from sin but Jesus,” Mohler concluded. For this purpose, even the apostle Paul said his powers were insufficient apart from the power of God, “not that we are sufficient in ourselves to claim anything as coming from us, but our sufficiency is from God” (2 Corinthians 3:5).

In keeping with Paul’s recognition of his own weakness, Mohler urged Christians to pray. “Our priority,” he said, “has to be to pray that God’s grace and mercy will be evident, especially in a situation such as this, and that Christ’s people will be deployed as agents of grace … that Christian parents will teach their children, Christian pastors will teach their congregations, and all of us will together learn by the spirit and the word what it means to be faithful Christians in such a difficult age.”

“God put us here in this time by his sovereignty for a purpose,” said Mohler. “Let’s pray we’ll be faithful to that purpose.”

AUTHOR

Joshua Arnold

Joshua Arnold is a staff writer at The Washington Stand.

RELATED ARTICLE: The GOP Should Look To New Solutions To Win Over Blue-State Voters Concerned About Crime And Mass Shootings

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Good Friday and The War for Our Souls

The name of this holiday is always jarring to me.

Good Friday, the day we observe the crucifixion of Jesus, first leaps upon our senses as everything bad. An illegal trial gone wrong; a miscarriage of justice; extreme acts of violence; an innocent man stricken, smitten, and afflicted. Not only that, but there’s also the loss of hope, the triumph and cruelty of the mob, and a people sent into hiding. It’s bad, it’s evil, and it’s everything nefarious rolled into one.

We only know Good Friday as good through the lens of Sunday’s resurrection. That’s why pausing too long on Good Friday is dangerous for our souls. God in his mercy moved the focal point of the fullness of time from Friday to Sunday. If we lag too long on Friday, we miss the movement of resurrection. If it all ends on Friday, our souls are stunted, and Friday is not good. The only hope for our souls lies on Sunday with Friday behind it.

Followers of Jesus remind ourselves of this movement year after year because by it our souls have been saved. And therefore we celebrate Christ’s death — a celebration of mourning that, with resurrection, turns into jubilation. The celebration is continuous because our memories are not. At minimum, we need this yearly reminder of what God has done for us in Christ. We needed it in the years following Jesus’s death, resurrection, and ascension, and we need it in 2023.

Especially in 2023.

There is, of course, nothing new under the sun. Anything novel today has been seen before in one fashion or another. But still, 2023 has its unique challenges for Christians. There is a certain type of war being waged for our souls, and here in America, to say it’s under a microscope would be an understatement. It’s under the floodlights, and it’s by no means subtle.

Back in the 2020 presidential campaign, then-candidate Joe Biden said in his nomination speech at the Democratic National Convention, “This campaign isn’t just about winning votes. It’s about winning the heart, and yes, the soul of America.” Even the Trump campaign picked up on this language, producing a video mocking the rhetoric while asking people to give to their own campaign in order to “save America’s soul.” More recently, President Biden upped the ante on our nation’s soul during his infamous September 2022 speech at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. Backdropped by ominous red lighting, a strangely imposing looking Biden railed:

“I ran for President because I believed we were in a battle for the soul of this nation. I still believe that to be true. I believe the soul is the breath, the life, and the essence of who we are. The soul is what makes us ‘us.’

The soul of America is defined by the sacred proposition that all are created equal in the image of God. That all are entitled to be treated with decency, dignity, and respect. That all deserve justice and a shot at lives of prosperity and consequence. And that democracy — democracy must be defended, for democracy makes all these things possible. Folks, and it’s up to us.”

The president made mention of “soul” eight times in that speech. And he’s continued to use the word gratuitously. In recent days declaring the Transgender Day of Visibility, he proclaimed, “Transgender Americans shape our Nation’s soul.” Make no mistake, while he may have grown up in suburban Pennsylvania, Joe Biden is most definitely a soul man.

Whether or not it’s Biden himself or one of his aides who is behind this overtly theological doctrine of the soul, it’s certainly a teaching at odds with the Bible’s concept of the soul. For Biden, “democracy makes all these things possible.” Contrast that with Paul: “For by him [Christ] all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities — all things were created through him and for him” (Colossians 1:16, ESV).

For Biden, transgender Americans shape our nation’s soul. The Bible’s view of shaping comes from a radically different frame: “For those whom he foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son, in order that he might be the firstborn among many brothers” (Romans 8:29, ESV).

We who follow Christ in America must live in Biden’s world, but we must not live as students of his doctrine. We live as expatriates, as citizens of a kingdom that is far away, but that is also already present but not yet fully realized.

On Good Friday, Jesus was crowned by his captors with a garland of thorns. But what was meant as mockery served as a coronation. King Jesus ascended not a throne there in Jerusalem, but a cross. Jesus’s substitutionary death for his people revealed that the battle for souls was far more than a battle for what makes us “us.” As the late John R.W. Stott, in his classic work “The Cross of Christ” observed, “What God in Christ has done through the cross is to rescue us, disclose himself and overcome evil.”

The good news of Good Friday is that this battle — this war — is ultimately one-sided. Victory for souls is won on the cross of Christ and only on the cross of Christ. And we as combatants in this battle must be captured by the cross to have any hope of Sunday’s resurrection. The alternative leaves us stranded on Friday, and that’s anything but good.

AUTHOR

Jared Bridges

Jared Bridges is editor-in-chief of The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. All rights reserved. ©2023 Family Research Council.


The Washington Stand is Family Research Council’s outlet for news and commentary from a biblical worldview. The Washington Stand is based in Washington, D.C. and is published by FRC, whose mission is to advance faith, family, and freedom in public policy and the culture from a biblical worldview. We invite you to stand with us by partnering with FRC.

Confront Evil, Protect the Vulnerable

There were signs of spring everywhere — in the bright morning sun, the pink flowers lining trees beside the parking lot, the signs for Easter services. As a small gray car rounded the bend, security cameras caught little children pumping their legs on swing sets in the background — the last carefree moment any of them will remember about this day. As they have in too many cities, Nashville’s moms and dads went about their days, not realizing they’d said goodbye for the last time.

For the seven families whose lives changed forever Monday morning, there is no making sense of the heartbreak. But for one set of parents, it’s a unique kind of pain — knowing their daughter is the one responsible. Norma Hale, whose Facebook page is full of proud mom moments, woke up Tuesday with the knowledge that her 28-year-old child’s last words to a friend were “I don’t want to live.” Moments later, Audrey Hale shot through the double glass doors she’d walked through hundreds of times as a Covenant school student, ready to kill.

Miles away, a stunned Averianna Patton sat holding her phone, rereading the text that something bad was about to happen. “Audrey!” she had frantically written back. “You have so much more life to live. I pray God keeps and covers you.”

But it was too late. Hale was walking the hallways of her old Christian school, gunning down anyone in her path. A beloved custodian. The revered head of the school. A favorite substitute teacher. The senior pastor’s only daughter. A nine-year-old boy and girl. In a split second, the buzz of classrooms gave way to sirens and school alarms.

Outside, officers grabbed rifles — listening to reports that some kids were unaccounted for. “Let’s go!” Officers Rex Engelbert is heard yelling to his men, who all take off running toward the gunfire. Unlike Uvalde, where police were paralyzed by indecision, Nashville’s team charged into the school and up the stairs, seeing Hale spraying bullets on the police cars below. Twenty-five seconds later, Officers Engelbert and Michael Callazo fired the shots that took her down — an act of pure and selfless heroism.

No one knows how many others might have died without these men sprinting into the face of evil. “The first call to 911 about shots being fired in the building came in at 10:13 a.m.,” Nashville Police Chief John Drake said. They saved lives. “Let us praise our first responders,” Mayor John Cooper urged. “Fourteen minutes,” Cooper said, referring to the time it took police to get to the scene and stop the shooter. “Fourteen minutes, under fire, running to gunfire.”

In the chaos that followed, children raced down the sidewalks in their school uniforms, holding hands with teachers. From every direction, panicked adults started to arrive, wondering if their child was one of the dead.

Inside, police tried to get a grasp on the casualties. Hale had “a significant amount” of ammunition, they discovered. And a manifesto. “There’s some belief that there was some resentment for having to go to that school,” Drake explained, as outlets started to pick up on the explosive news that Audrey identified as Aiden.

Immediately, the Left turned loose its attack dogs, savaging Drake and the media for “misgendering” the shooter that everyone had rightly described as a woman. Within hours, both USA Today and The New York Times apologized for calling Audrey a “female,” ultimately editing stories and headlines to appease the unappeasable mob who have fostered hostility for those who refuse to yield to their dangerous and destructive charade.

Hours later, the blame game began in earnest. None of this would have happened, activists said, if society were more accepting of the trans ideology, if Audrey’s parents had just been more open to her male identity, if states had just stopped banning drag shows and kids’ gender transitions.

One NBC reporter even went so far as to lay responsibility at the feet of conservatives for fighting to protect children from the transgender ideology that so obviously haunted Hale. “The GOP have decided that guns are more important than kids,” actor Josh Gad argued. “They have decided it is okay to let kids die.” If she was a victim of anything, others claimed, it was “intolerant … brainwashing” and “religious indoctrination.” Then came the ridicule. “Is it possible they weren’t praying enough?” talk show host David Pakman mocked the school. “If prayers alone worked there wouldn’t have been a mass shooting at a school where they pray…” one gun control activist scoffed.

Make no mistake. A storm is brewing in this country that screams, “Christianity is the problem!” The calls will come — if they haven’t already — for the faithful to step back from cultural engagement, to acquiesce on biblical truth where the battle is raging the fiercest: for our children. It’s the same argument the Left has been using on the parents of confused kids — give in or they’ll hurt themselves. To the church it will be: back off or they’ll hurt others.

The inclination will be to move away from biblical truth, the very source of hope and freedom that confused and troubled souls like Audrey need. But that’s not the way forward in a nation broken and bleeding. As much as the other side would like to manage the chaos by indulging these delusions and passing meaningless legislation, the problem isn’t the state of our laws; it’s the condition of the heart.

These tragedies, whether they’re in Nashville or Newtown, are the bitter fruit of a deception that’s destroying us. It’s time to address these lies with urgency, acknowledging that we are a broken people in need of the God that we keep pushing away. It is our moment to do what the brave officers in Nashville did: confront and engage the crisis. These aren’t men who sat on the sidelines, letting the shooter take aim at more children. They rushed straight into the face of danger and protected the weak. As Christians, we’re called to do the same: confront evil and protect the vulnerable so they may know Jesus.

That’s not easy in a society as hostile to truth as ours. But we do not honor the memories of Evelyn Dieckhaus, Hallie Scruggs, Williams Kinney, Mike Hill, Cynthia Peak, and Katherine Koonce by abandoning the faith they died living. A spiritual battle is raging for this generation, and we will not win it with silence. We’ve been called, as Ezekiel was called, to speak the word of God in dark days — no matter the cost. “Be not afraid of them, nor be afraid of their words … [Y]ou shall speak my words to them, whether they hear or refuse to hear, for they are a rebellious house” (2:6a,7).

For now, we are a nation swimming in grief. But consider the timing of this tragedy, so near Easter. In this season of empty tombs, we cling to the only hope capable of holding the hurting together. “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet he shall live” (John 11:25). To those families suffering under the weight of unspeakable loss, we rejoice with them that Jesus’s death was not the end of His story — and it will not be the end of theirs either.

AUTHOR

Tony Perkins

Tony Perkins is president of Family Research Council and executive editor of The Washington Stand.

EDITORS NOTE: This Washington Stand column is republished with permission. ©2023 Family Research Council.


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